While the present invention was developed for use in games, and is described in the context of a game environment, in particular a game employing video and/or sound clips, visual and/or auditory content and still pictures or text, as will be better understood from the following description, certain features and aspects of the invention may find use in other environments, including, but not limited to, other game environments and educational, training, and promotional environments.
In the past, games about movies or other subject matter that can be visually and/or auditorially displayed, such as video-recorded sports events, have involved asking a player or group of players questions concerning the movie or other video subject matter without any direct viewing of a clip of the movie or other video subject matter. Past games involving visually displayable subject matter, e.g., movies, sporting events, news events, were not as enjoyable as they could have been because they failed to incorporate visual images of the subject matter, i.e., video clips, in an acceptable manner. While movie games could have employed media players, such as DVD players or video cassette players, to play clips during a game, they would have had to play the clips in a sequential, hence predictable, manner. While playing such a game for the first time presents new questions, repeated play becomes predictable and eliminates the enjoyment and surprise that should accompany a good game (or educational, training, or promotional tool).
DVD players have an advantage over video cassette players in that DVD players can quickly and accurately access specific segments of data anywhere on the medium. However, due to the limited programmable abilities of DVD players, it has been generally assumed that DVD players are incapable of randomly shuffling through a large number of video and/or sound clips without repeating a clip. Random shuffling, of course, is one of the keys to success in any game that generates information, such as movie scenes or other video clips, and asks the players questions about the generated information.
There are many obstacles to programming random shuffling into media players, such as DVD players. DVD players are unlike computers equipped with DVD-ROMs. Computers have available highly programmable CPUs, large storage capacity (both in memory and on disc), and are capable of generating very good random numbers. In contrast, DVD players provide only a limited set of programmable abilities, have minimal storage capacity, and while all DVD players must provide a random number generator, many are incapable of generating usable random numbers. For instance, some random number generators in DVD players give definite “weight” to certain numbers, mostly ones. However, even when DVD players can generate good random numbers, DVD players only provide a limited number of, usually 16, general registers for storage. While a DVD player may be able to track which of a few clips have previously been selected, thereby ensuring that all clips are eventually selected without repeats, tracking more than the available number of general register (e.g., 16) clips has been assumed to be beyond a DVD player's ability.
The present invention is directed to solving the foregoing and other limitations and problems associated with using media players, such as DVD players, to randomly shuffle through a plurality of clips stored on the media that controls such players.